


Less than Wonderland

by Mi_n_ico



Category: Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: Bede is non-binary I don’t make the rules, Fae Shenanigans, Gen, This is mostly writing practice, but I’m posting it anyway cause it turned out good
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:46:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24294565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mi_n_ico/pseuds/Mi_n_ico
Summary: Gloria invited Bede out to a camping trip out on the edge of the Tundra where she grew up, and Bede was actually excited to go! Until the directions to get there blew away into Glimwood Tangle! Will Bede get the directions back and get back in time?(in other words: Bede gets lost to find something else)
Kudos: 9





	Less than Wonderland

**Author's Note:**

> This whole thing is just... me toying with some stuff. I wanted to work on my non-dialogue scenes, as well as a particular method of characterizing Bede that I wanted to play with.  
> A good way to push your skills and improve your craft is to put arbitrary limits on your writing as a challenge: in this case, I decided to only refer to Bede by name in this piece! It took a lot of mental gymnastics for it to not sound super clunky, and I deeply envy languages where this is easier to accomplish!

The Tundra was going to be cold. 

No shit, its a tundra. 

But the point is that Bede only had one winter coat, and wearing it wasn't exactly a joyous concept. 

The garish fuschia thing hung at the back of the gym's coat closet, Bede hadn't touched it since arriving in Ballonlea the first time. 

But if Bede was going to the camping trip... the coat was going too. At least until one of the others offered a spare, which Bede was sure they would. They were smart enough to own more than one. 

Grimacing, Bede shrugged the dusty coat on, nose wrinkling at the musty smell that clung to it. had it been that long sitting forgotten in the closet? Bede had meant to buy a replacement and get rid of the old thing, but it hadn't been cold since before the tournament, so Bede completely forgot it. 

But that could come later, for now there was the matter of getting to the property. It wasn't as if they could just taxi there, it was out of the range and didn't have a proper station for miles. But you could taxi close to it, and as a group of seasoned trainers it shouldn't be a problem to walk the short route up there. 

Bede stood at the edge of Ballonlea, intent on using the light of a mushroom to read the directions on the invitation, but it was in vain as an unwieldy wind picked up, whistling through the trees and ripping it from Bede's hands. 

It flew into the treeline, and Bede cursed low and ran after it. 

Every time Bede was so sure this was the last time, the wind would again pick up, pulling it just out of reach but still in sight. it was a long, frustrating process, and Bede was tiring of it quickly. 

Why not just call Gloria and ask for new directions?

Bede took the phone out of the coat pocket, stomach dropping as the screen read a resounding "no signal"

Well, surely this wasn't that bad, service was rather spotty in the Tangle, all Bede needed to do was get back to... Ballonlea...

...But this forest didn't even look like the Tangle anymore. There were no glowing mushrooms, no lush foliage or playful pokemon. 

This forest was gray, silent, pine trees knitting together a canopy that blocked out all light. it was similar to the Slumbering Weald, Bede noted, but lacking in fog, and colder. 

There was a path, Bede noticed, just a worn down space where no little bushes were growing. some little trail that Pokemon used.

It was a good of a lead as any, so Bede decided to follow it. 

The trees gave way a few minutes later, and Bede cursed as it became increasingly obvious that the Tangle was far from this place. 

The path dumped out at the edge of a road, raised up with slopes of gravel on either side. The pavement was long and straight, black with damp, running left and right as far as the eye could see, which wasn't exactly far since Bede was in a ditch.

As Bede climbed up the slope to stand on the pavement two things became immediately clear. one, it was very close to dusk. And two, it was raining. 

Not a hard rain, but a deceptively chilled drizzle that would soak you without noticing. The trainers adorning Bedes feet were already wet, which Bede hadn't noticed until that moment. It wasn't until Bede looked that the wet cold feeling reached notice. 

But it didn't look like there was anywhere to go but down the road. One way the pavement lead out onto a windy, wet prarie, and one lead along the edge of the forest. Bede chose the forest. 

The wind ripped a chilly hole through Bede, even in the jacket. Or perhaps, it was the jacket at fault? 

Bede looked down, shocked at the sight. The once vibrant winter coat had faded to a dull pinky lavender color, and rips were scattered about through it. Some had been messity patched up, but others showed the yellow stuff inside it. It felt tight around the shoulders, and Bede was sure it was supposed to be longer. It didn't keep out the damp chill at all. 

The coat hadn't been ripped when Bede looked down at the shoes... had it?

The road kept on straight for a while, dipping up and down, an abandoned freeway on one side behind a decrepit barbed wire fence, and a forest on the other behind a well-kept wooden one. The wind semed to rip even more holes in the coat, and Bede began to shiver. the sun behind the clouds sunk low beyond the horizon, Bede's long shadow fading to nothing. And just as all hope seemed lost, there was a bend in the road, and a strange scene at the corner. 

Around the outer edge of the curve, in the increasung area between the straight wire fence and the curving road, a whole bedroom sat without a house, among the long prarie grass. A four poster bed, nightstand, and wardrobe sat on a ragged rug in the grass. 

The entire thing seemed utterly untouched by the rain. 

Bede knew better than to mess with such things but the vercy concept of getting to a dry location was more temptation that Opal's warnings could fend off.

Bede cautiously stepped off the road to investigate, finding the wardrobe unlocked, and an entire outfit neatly arranged inside. A soft periwinkle sweatshirt, a purple beanie, a tawny flannel button up shirt, a white loose short sleeve top, a pair of insulated pants, and hiking boots that matched the button up. 

The doors were engraved with the words "For anyone who needs them, but everything has a price" 

Bede looked around, and feeling deperate and soaked to the bone, attempted to remove the clothes from the rack. 

They didn't budge, and the engraving glowed. 

"But I don't have anything!" Bede cried, banging on the wood. 

The engraving faded and changed, 

"Yes you do." 

"No I don't," Bede insisted, "Look I don't even have anything in my-"

Bede stopped short, one hand shoved into the pocket of the coat. Where Bede had expected to find an empty pocket, instead hesitant fingers curled around a familiar object. 

With deep hesitance Bede pulled from the pocket the expensive watch Rose had bought for a birthday present. 

It had gotten lost somewhere during the move to Ballonlea, and Bede figured it would just turn up whenever. But had it really been in the coat pocket the whole time? 

Hesitantly, Bede placed the gold watch onto the shelf in the closet, and retrieved the clothes. 

"thank you." the engraving read

Without anywhere else to put them, Bede hung the damp, damaged outfit up in the wardrobe. perhaps it's magic would repair them for the next weary and ill prepared traveller to pass through. 

The clothes were warm, warmer than that silly coat had ever been. Perhaps it was the layers, Gloria had always sworn by layering after all. The thin but strong fibers were easier to move in than the bulky synthetics too. 

Bede stayed a moment, hoping to find some other secret or wait out the rain. But the bedside table had nothing but some matches and the bed was just a bed. And the rain showed no sign of stopping. 

it wasn't getting darker though, even as Bede stopped to count to 100 just to make sure. So perhaps staying in the santuary was fruitless, it didn't seem like time passed quikly there.

Without anything left to do in the little rest stop Bede carried on, around the bend and into a section of the road bracketed by pine trees on either side, not quite the dense forest from before--in fact it seemed like beyond the right hand treeline, just behind the wooden fence, there was a meadow of some kind--but not the prarie from before. 

Woods, Bede supposed was the appropriate word. And as curious as Bede was, one risk was enough for the day. the rest stop paid off, but would climbing over a fence?

Another straightaway, Bede could see the destination this time. A tall wooden gate, a square arch, if that is a thing that exists. like a massive doorway. So this was a driveway of some kind? 

It took a few minues of walking, but Bede made it to the massive gate. And surprisingly, there was a second gate next to the first. a simple metal gate, also locked, with a wooden fence between. the second gate showed a gravel road beyond, leading back into the thicker wood. 

Despite the thousands of reasons not to, Bede ducked under the wooden fence and began wandering down the gravel path. At least this WAS a path, that had to count for something. Very quickly it's purpose was determined, the fence broke into a second gate, leading out into what Bede had thought to be a meadow. It appeared to be a training field of some kind, an obstacle course of jumps decorated the grassy field. 

Bede yearned for Rapidash in that moment, those jumps seemed perfectly designed for riding.

But Bede continued down the path, past a three path junction, on until something unusual was found. 

A beated-through path not unlike the one that started this adventure. leading just off the main path. 

Bede became uncomfortably aware that the path had lead in a circle. An impossible circle. This location should be directly behind the forest Bede came from, but there was just the training field and a small green belt of trees before what must be the driveway. 

It was a good a path as any. Bede followed it. 

It lead to a clearing with a bush with white flowes. Bede stopped to admire it a moment before moving on. It felt... important. But All Bede accomplished was getting wet, as the flowers didn't say a thing. 

There was a crossroads there, and looking down the lefthand one Bede could see smoke through the trees. Bede shuddered with something unearthly. 

Right hand path it was.

From there the path lead on until it seemingly met up with the gravel road. The opposite side of this path was back to the open woods, vibrant grass under the sparse trees. 

The rain had mostly stopped by now. 

The other side seemed to be a path of its own, faded from dissuse and overgrown, but there enough for Bede to follow it under the tunnel canopy of broadleaf trees that made it up. 

The path lead by a little creek, and Bede supposed there might have been a pond at the end, but such a venture was foregone in favor of exploring a strange bunch of objects in a little grove of dead trees. 

All the other ground seemed to have been maintained, but the area in this grove was overgrown. And all around the edge of it there were worn down spots where something had been recently moved. fallen branches and bark bits littered the edges, with rope and even tape...

The whole thing felt deeply sad. 

In the center of the overgrown clearing there was a big wooden spool with an overturned plastic stool on top of it, and an old jump rope piled up on top. A pile of rocks sat at its base, and it was clear where they'd been moved from, what used to be a fire pit. 

Plywood sheets leaned on dead tree trunks and there was a waist high pile of cut branches and logs set up at the edge. 

A sudden realization passed, that this was a dead childhood Bede was standing in. And so a moment was taken to mourn it, and the small hands that had so lovingly warped the grove into some special hidaway. 

Bede could almost picture it, the bushy trees that sprouted round and tall, with little circles of space inside, with plywood ceilings and floors to make little rooms. The fallen branches and dead logs so lovingly warped and woven together, the scraps of duct tape and string on the forest floor binding together the parts that wouldn't stay. The metal fence posts piled up at the side fortifying a particularly long section, Bede could still see the holes where they'd once stood. A fire pit woefully unused, the fist sized rocks clearly gathered from the shale gravel road Bede had just crossed, perhaps the neon green bucket at the base of the spool table was used to cart them over so they could be lovingly placed in a natures jigsaw to create the beginnings of a stone floor. 

Someone had clearly worked quite hard on this. And somebody just tore it down, Bede could still smell the freshly cut wood. 

Bede cut up to past where the path turned, and standing there swore that there was singing. Turning around, through the open wood Bede could see a fire pit--not the one from a little while ago either, it was far too close to be that--and around it a familiar group of people stood. 

Hop, Raihan, Marnie, Piers, Sonia... it was the campsite. There were trailers and tents set up. 

Fearful of what was possible with magic, Bede decided not to approach the group just yet. There was no way this was the campground, how did Bede even get here? 

The path Bede just walked was practically a circle--nearly a figure eight by now! There was no way!

So Bede crossed the path again and headed to the back of a bush. 

The area behind the wall of gnarled bushes was almost a picturesque garden, bright grass and big round flowering bushes, and yet it looked wild. 

And at the back end there was a single tall fir tree standing on its own, And Bede knew that tree was the place to go. Somehow. 

Bede hurried through the garden to the big tree standing on its own. And underneath the tall, narrow, drooping branches, Bede felt safe. This was a tiny piece of home, and Bede could feel it. 

Just as Bede reached out to touch the trunk, a voice called out. 

"Hey! You made it!" 

Bede turned around like lightning, to see Leon standing right where Bede had just been standing. 

"Uh... yeah." 

Leon smiled and held something out, "You dropped this." 

Bede gaped, it was the directions to the campsite. 

"Oh... uh... thank you... sorry I'm late" 

Leon nodded, "decided to take the long way?" 

"I... may have gotten slightly side tracked. Um this is going to sound strange but-"

"I figured you might." Leon interrupted with a ruffle to Bede's hair, "No shame in getting a little lost, happens to me all the time. Sometimes you have something you need to do that's just a bit more important than reaching your destination, and that's okay. You're here now, and that's what counts. Let's head back to the group."

Leon's arm wrapped around Bede's shoulder, and Bede felt the warmth deep. The rain might not penetrate the layers of warm fabric, but the warmth of Leons friendly hold most certainly did.


End file.
